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Vuscovi language
Vuscovi (Yѡi Ѵuscoѵo`бaѧto, pronounced jʌ.wiː.vʊs.ko.vɔː.ˈbɑːx.to) is a Wilusic language spoken in the nations of Tyvic and Vasque. It derives its vocabulary from ancient Wilusic, with prior descendants assumed to be ancient languages of the Shining South, much like the two other language families of The Gloaming North. Vuscovi features many regional dialects, with creoles widely spoken beyond the borders of the Vuscovi fatherland, including Empearvin, Voovin, Vuscoran and Emerian. The third most spoken language in the continent, Vuscovi eclipses even the larger Tearvin language as the second most written language throughout the continent, and this is very much due to a long Wilushan-era tradition stressing the right to literacy for all men, women and children of age, with even the most isolated of Vuscovi villages capable of reading and writing. However the modern era has seen literacy rates drop for the lower classes in Tyvic, born from a lack of desire for Empyrian capitalists to fund education for all the "unwashed" members of the peasantry, and is kept from death only by the extreme adherence to tradition that characterises all Empyrian villages. Vuscovi is written using the Vuscovi Alphabet, a system that has drawn solely from the Altean and Tearvin alphabets. In addition to the 26 Altean letters, Vuscovi also uses several Tearvin and Tearvin-inspired letters for sounds that Altean letters cannot approximate. In Standard Vuscovi these are Ж/ж, Ѧ/ѧ and Ѩ/ѩ, with other dialects using additional letters. Furthermore, depending on dialect in question, some Altean letters are often instead written in their Tearvin alphabetic variant. This is most typically a phenomenon when the letters in question are close to identical (i.e. b/б, k/к, w/ѡ, m/м). Vuscovi is a pluricentric language, with multiple regions having their own standardised variants (e.g. Central Empyrian, Eastern Empyrian) as well as many dialects. Central Empyrian (a widespread dialect of Vuscovi spoken in Tyvic) is officially regarded as the standard language by most nations of the continent, however this status is not officially recognised by Vasque. History Geographic Distribution Dialects A pluricentric language, Vuscovi features many different linguistic styles and traditions, however is officially commandeered by an official lexicon, “Empyrian”. On the subject of deeper Vuscovi linguistic study, there are around several dozen other native dialects which are officially recognised alongside the major triad, however there still remains countless further languages, some native only to singular villages, all of which may never see a place within the archives of mainstream study. There exist three main branches of Vuscovi. Empyrian Also known as High Vuscovi or Stallion Dialect to Voovites, is the standard lexicon that all other variants of the language are compared against, and is the primary language that is required to at least be partially understood for those who wish to seek careers or lives outside of the comfort of their home village’s customs. The most modernised of the dialects, Empyrian is favoured by many scholars across the continent due to its more relaxed grammar and softer sounds that greatly ease pronunciation. Dialects and creoles categorised as Empyrian derivatives include Central Empyrian, Eastern Empyrian, Emerian, Empearvin and Nakon. Voonis Also known as "Voonisian" or, rarely, "Voovian". The standard language of the Voonis dialect, furthermore known as “Low Vuscovi” or "Wolf's Dialect". The dialect of all Vuscovi who resisted the embrace of The Stallion and retained the ancient religion of Wolf Druidism, Voonis is the largest dialect in the entire language, and is spoken entirely in Vasque. Since the split of languages, Voonis has come to bear many independently developed traits. Like other dialects, methods of expression and description in Voonis are very different to that of its mother language. With the exception of the letter ю'' for "oo", Voonis also retains the dated use of various, individual letters to deal with new sounds created by combinations of two letters, such as th and xh respectively becoming Ѫ and Ӝ. Wilushan The oldest surviving branch of Vuscovi, and is commonly referred to as “ancient Vuscovi” due to its parachronistic perception to most other speakers of Vuscovi, as well as the fact that its most commonly encountered iteration is that of ancient text on age-old ruins, stone tablets and scrolls. Wilusha is a considerably different language than that of Voonis and Empyrian, bearing hundreds of ancient words, pronunciations, and a selection of noticeably different grammatical rules. Grammar Its three genders are male, female and neuter, signified by gendered articles (like the non-gendered English ''the or a/an, or more similarly, the German der, die and das) and the general construction of nouns, adjectives, verbs and adverbs. Generally, masculine words are more harsh and mechanical, whilst feminine words are more flowing and liquid. Neuter words are combinations of both. Many proper nouns, such as the names of places, the names of celestial bodies, or the names of the thirteen months of Vuscovi calendar, are written in feminine form. Vuscovi apophony (the alternation of sounds within a word that indicate grammatical information, e.g. the English "write" or "wrote") always demonstrates itself as suffixes to words, and through changes of letter pronunciations when they are stressed through agglutination. The spelling/pronunciation of words does not change when a word shifts from one word class to another (e.g. from a verb to noun, such as the English "believe" respectively becoming "belief"), and this is quite possibly due to the incredibly blurred distinction between word classes. Rather than rigidly defined word classes, Vuscovi instead agglutinates words (i.e. creates compound words) to achieve adjectival and adverbial functions, with little to no restriction on which word can agglutinate with another. The language freely allows all nouns and verbs to function as descriptive words, or even one-another (nouns functioning as verbs, verbs functioning as nouns, etc), with only a few words - referred to as "dependant words" - existing solely for the purpose of description. Owing to this, concepts or objects or things can then be described with a wide range of depth and specificity, since any two or three words can be combined to create one anew. Such results include - but are not limited to - incredibly specific terms (e.g. "sword-wound", "westward-industrial-train", "fast-run-exhausted", etc), double negatives, or contradictory words ("lie-truth", "good-bad", "yes-no", etc). The organised syntax of Vuscovi sentences additionally disallows words from being misinterpreted, usually due to the appearance of certain suffixes. Like Daltan and Tearvin, Vuscovi is an inflected language. There are seven noun cases: nominative, genitive, ablative, dative, accusative, instrumental, and prepositional. Vuscovi also frequently utilises word conjugation. Pronouns are conjugated for case and/or plural; verbs are conjugated for tense, with eight usable tenses. Plurals are revealed through conjugated articles rather than suffixes to words. Additionally, articles are also conjugated for prepositional functions. With this, Vuscovi prepositions can quickly appear to act strangely if compared to the employment of auxiliary words found in English (i.e. "against" or "from") or even in Russian ("против" and "от" respectively), a language closer to Vuscovi grammatically. When a preposition and a plural are both required (e.g. “rifle's lying' upon the weapon rack”), either an exact numerical value is given before the noun, or the word is agglutinated with the dependent word “''Uqa''”, meaning “of an arbitrary amount". Alphabet Letters with no stressed names stress instead with their normal letter name. Vocabulary Orthography Phonology Vuscovi loanwords in other languages See also *Full Vuscovi lexicon (Google Document) Notes